Food, and fandom
Dec. 8th, 2003 11:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
petroniaThat and music, and you have this blog in a nutshell. I guess what I like are simple subjects with infinite depth. XD
Post the last note I went to Movenpick's, down the street from McGill campus, and committed fowl murder on a half roast chicken and fries. Movenpick's is designed for one to pick at a smorgasbord of little (expensive) platters of mix-and-match world cuisines, really, but it does have some great hearty dishes, and the roast chicken is one of them. And the fries! When I was pulling late-nighters at McGill I'd go to Movenpick's just for fries. 2$ with tax for a goodly plate, and you can taste the thick-sliced golden potato. Mmm.
En déchiquetant mon poulet I ruminated over the OTP discussion that's been bouncing about the flist here and there, because I'd never considered it before - I don't have OTPs, right? I read everything, and if it's a crack pairing I just shrug and expect the author to work that much harder to convince me. Then I thought, y'know, that's all very well and good but I don't write everything, do I. So then I figured I had OTPs after all. And then I thought about it some more, and figured that it all depended. ...Which I realise is spectacularly unhelpful, but. XD Part of it has to do with my definition of "true", and part of it has to do with the character's. I mean Brad x Schu, okay, is obviously the closest thing to an OTP I have, and that wouldn't make me object to fic in which Schuldich goes off and has mad sex with Nagi or Aya. Fic in which Schudich runs off with Nagi happily after would tend to bother me, and do. We learn from this that I make an instinctive non-equation between physical fidelity and emotional fidelity, as do uchi no Schu and Brad (or he would if he didn't think sex with other people was more trouble than it was worth, albeit pleasant enough). Some of my other characters don't draw the line, in which case I defer to the character. Thus you have the situation whereby I have a more rabidly OTP-like reaction to Sirius x Remus than anything else, nearly Kristin levels. (Worse than Kristin in a sense, because they make me go seme-uke as well. ^^;) As in it bothers me to catch James x Sirius hints in canon. I'd still read it, so it's not rabid-rabid, but it's rabid for me.
Typically, though, what I do in my head is fiddle the physical fidelity bit. Given the incentive my ships tend to become loosely poly (Fuuga-style shrug-and-incorporate), or... relationships in which one or the other cheats, frankly, which I guess is what an "unacknowledged" poly comes down to. o_O; I just can't think of it as cheating in a disapproving sense. I don't think of it as cheating in real life, either; possibly because it seems obvious to me that you'd want to keep some part of your life entirely separate from your loved one(s) no matter how close you were, and if you wanted to make it sexual encounters you never tell them about then hey whatever works for you (use a condom etc.). The moral outrage is reserved for those who run off leaving their wives in the lurch with three kids and no job, say, which falls more under emotional infidelity / being a general asshat. But we deal with that if and when it becomes an issue. I mean I've never wanted to sleep with several attainable people at once; I can go for years without coming across one person I'd sleep with, what are the odds of running into a second within the same close timespan? Ha. ...I also tend not to write it as such, in case you were taken aback. XD Mentally flipping through my fics, there's only Ofuro which is an honest-to-goodness threesome. This is because normally you'd have to write a fic establishing Pairing One, then a fic establishing Pairing Two, then a third fic establishing how One and Two become Three, which is about two fics more than I typically have the stamina for. Unless of course it really is Juubei-Kadzuki-Toshiki, in which case the canon kindly took a tankoubon or two out to do all one's dirty work for one. Huzzah for canon.
...I bet people are waiting for me to say something about Ban and Ginji at this point. XD;;; Uh. I'd like to say physical fidelity doesn't matter there, but in truth I think about it and it gets Complicated. (Himiko also involves emotional issues. Akabane involves lots of blood. Anyone else from the cast involves one-time-only, possible drunkenness and let-us-never-speak-of-this-again, let alone anyone else finding out.) What I'm certain of is that - even if one takes as axiom that they're both totally straight and totally not into each other in a sexual way - any girl either of them ends up dating would rapidly develop Issues. ^^; I know I would.
Dang, that was long. It was supposed to be a short note. >_> Ah vell... Have also been watching those infamous TeniMyu clips, gulping amaretto-and-soda and laughing my head off and all the while thinking that my tolerance for cheesy crack has noticeably increased, as five years ago I wouldn't have been able to sit through the thing. Not with the 80's synths and shimmying and break-dancing through stage tennis matches. Then I realised that it was merely my tolerance for musical theatre that's increased (all the opera I watch but never talk about, after I figured out that I enjoy opera much more if I could see what was happening, even if all the characters were fat - mostly recently Madame Butterfly, in keeping with the Meiji theme).
Then I realised the two were equivalent. :D
Post the last note I went to Movenpick's, down the street from McGill campus, and committed fowl murder on a half roast chicken and fries. Movenpick's is designed for one to pick at a smorgasbord of little (expensive) platters of mix-and-match world cuisines, really, but it does have some great hearty dishes, and the roast chicken is one of them. And the fries! When I was pulling late-nighters at McGill I'd go to Movenpick's just for fries. 2$ with tax for a goodly plate, and you can taste the thick-sliced golden potato. Mmm.
En déchiquetant mon poulet I ruminated over the OTP discussion that's been bouncing about the flist here and there, because I'd never considered it before - I don't have OTPs, right? I read everything, and if it's a crack pairing I just shrug and expect the author to work that much harder to convince me. Then I thought, y'know, that's all very well and good but I don't write everything, do I. So then I figured I had OTPs after all. And then I thought about it some more, and figured that it all depended. ...Which I realise is spectacularly unhelpful, but. XD Part of it has to do with my definition of "true", and part of it has to do with the character's. I mean Brad x Schu, okay, is obviously the closest thing to an OTP I have, and that wouldn't make me object to fic in which Schuldich goes off and has mad sex with Nagi or Aya. Fic in which Schudich runs off with Nagi happily after would tend to bother me, and do. We learn from this that I make an instinctive non-equation between physical fidelity and emotional fidelity, as do uchi no Schu and Brad (or he would if he didn't think sex with other people was more trouble than it was worth, albeit pleasant enough). Some of my other characters don't draw the line, in which case I defer to the character. Thus you have the situation whereby I have a more rabidly OTP-like reaction to Sirius x Remus than anything else, nearly Kristin levels. (Worse than Kristin in a sense, because they make me go seme-uke as well. ^^;) As in it bothers me to catch James x Sirius hints in canon. I'd still read it, so it's not rabid-rabid, but it's rabid for me.
Typically, though, what I do in my head is fiddle the physical fidelity bit. Given the incentive my ships tend to become loosely poly (Fuuga-style shrug-and-incorporate), or... relationships in which one or the other cheats, frankly, which I guess is what an "unacknowledged" poly comes down to. o_O; I just can't think of it as cheating in a disapproving sense. I don't think of it as cheating in real life, either; possibly because it seems obvious to me that you'd want to keep some part of your life entirely separate from your loved one(s) no matter how close you were, and if you wanted to make it sexual encounters you never tell them about then hey whatever works for you (use a condom etc.). The moral outrage is reserved for those who run off leaving their wives in the lurch with three kids and no job, say, which falls more under emotional infidelity / being a general asshat. But we deal with that if and when it becomes an issue. I mean I've never wanted to sleep with several attainable people at once; I can go for years without coming across one person I'd sleep with, what are the odds of running into a second within the same close timespan? Ha. ...I also tend not to write it as such, in case you were taken aback. XD Mentally flipping through my fics, there's only Ofuro which is an honest-to-goodness threesome. This is because normally you'd have to write a fic establishing Pairing One, then a fic establishing Pairing Two, then a third fic establishing how One and Two become Three, which is about two fics more than I typically have the stamina for. Unless of course it really is Juubei-Kadzuki-Toshiki, in which case the canon kindly took a tankoubon or two out to do all one's dirty work for one. Huzzah for canon.
...I bet people are waiting for me to say something about Ban and Ginji at this point. XD;;; Uh. I'd like to say physical fidelity doesn't matter there, but in truth I think about it and it gets Complicated. (Himiko also involves emotional issues. Akabane involves lots of blood. Anyone else from the cast involves one-time-only, possible drunkenness and let-us-never-speak-of-this-again, let alone anyone else finding out.) What I'm certain of is that - even if one takes as axiom that they're both totally straight and totally not into each other in a sexual way - any girl either of them ends up dating would rapidly develop Issues. ^^; I know I would.
Dang, that was long. It was supposed to be a short note. >_> Ah vell... Have also been watching those infamous TeniMyu clips, gulping amaretto-and-soda and laughing my head off and all the while thinking that my tolerance for cheesy crack has noticeably increased, as five years ago I wouldn't have been able to sit through the thing. Not with the 80's synths and shimmying and break-dancing through stage tennis matches. Then I realised that it was merely my tolerance for musical theatre that's increased (all the opera I watch but never talk about, after I figured out that I enjoy opera much more if I could see what was happening, even if all the characters were fat - mostly recently Madame Butterfly, in keeping with the Meiji theme).
Then I realised the two were equivalent. :D
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no subject
Date: 2003-12-09 12:38 am (UTC)this is something of a basis for the "ban and ginji are straight and have no desire to fuck one another" fic that I'm working on (it is one among the many GB fics I'm working on which aren't finished, and I am sure it feels sad and lonely given that two of the others are yaoi PWP ^^;).
When Andrea and I first started fangirling about this series, long long ago, and later when Wen and I were fangirling about it, we all came to that same conclusion, though: regardless of what their relationship is, both of them have severe Ish and they need the other person for stability.
They are TEH BEST FRIENDS EVAR and think about one another before and above anything else. They are so codependant and emotionally screwed up that to be one of their girlfriends assumes that you love the idea of never being alone with him, and him constantly running off with his buddy or thinking about his buddy if they're apart. We decided they really just have no time or space in their lives for a relationship of the magnitude that romance requires. Which is not to say never (ask me about my ginji/natsumi fic! XD) but hmm.... not any time soon. XD
no subject
Date: 2003-12-09 06:42 am (UTC)but then I'm either 'don't care about the chars much so don't care about the pairings, as long as the fic's written well' - Weiss, Gundam Wing; or rabidly, scarily OTP - Saiyuki, GB. I guess there's a 3rd category, in which I don't really see the romance much anyway, but if it's well done I'll try it out - Harry Potter...but then, since I don't see it in HP (except Remus/Sirius are pretty convincing...), all slash is A/U to me, and the Harry and Snape going at it might as well be original chars.
...This might come from me being a canon whore - most times there's a direct correlation between canon support for a pairing and my loyalty to it. So while I'm fond of BradxSchu or ThorxYamino, their few interactions don't inspire the devotion that Ginji dying with only Ban on his mind does. Or why I don't go for SanoxKenshin despite the support for it, because KenshinxKaoru is pretty damn hard to write off (and Kenshin is the straightest straight guy ever to swing a sword, but don't get me into that)
I also have a case of really liking relationships that I don't see as sexual at all - so I adore Ban and Shido's interplay, but freak at the suggestion of ShiBan...
no subject
Date: 2003-12-09 12:46 pm (UTC)They are, but I also think at some point, it'll break up. Or rather, Ban will move on; he's had a life of his own long before he met Ginji, and he'll continue having a life of his own afterwards. Whether he winds up merely emulating Paul and going for a mentor role, or just keep going and going until one of these days, he slips up and gets his fool ass killed, or whether he'll actually ::gasp:: settle down - hey, if Shido can do it, *he* can - isn't at all certain, but regardless, I can't see them *not* coming to a clash over something. Or merely growing tired of each other...
no subject
Date: 2003-12-09 01:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-12-09 09:01 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-12-09 09:46 am (UTC)Unagi-meshi.
This dish is not really cooking, just assembly. But it is very good.
Makes four servings.
Ingredients.
3-3.5 cups med grain/Japanese rice (meaning that little cup you get with the rice cooker, not that you end up with three cups of steamed rice) dry, then steamed.
Awasezu, about 3/4 cup or however much necessary (you know, that mixture that you put on to make regular rice sushi rice. Better and far more economical if you make your own.)
Green nori furikake (optional)
Unagi no tare sauce (buy this in an Asian grocery)
Roasted sesame seeds (optional)
Two 8-oz ounce packages of high-quality frozen broiled seasoned unagi (retails for approx. $4 per package. It should be the sort that has some sauce on it)
1. Cook rice in rice cooker and put unagi out to defrost.
2. Put the rice in a large bowl and sprinkle on awasezu (not all at once). Season to taste. Rice should be shiny when done.
3. Get four bowls and distribute rice equally.
4. Sprinkle rice lightly with unagi no tare sauce in cross hatch pattern. This is easier if the tare sauce has been in the refrigerator, because it thickens. Do not put too much, because the sauce is very salty.
5. Season lightly with furikake.
6. Remove unagi from package, place on plate, cover and microwave until very warm, about one minute.
7. Cut unagi into bite size pieces and distribute among bowls. Sprinkle a very small bit of tare sauce on unagi, and season with sesame seeds. Serve.